Sacred bull
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
"It is only natural that the two most prominent animal figures in the mythical heaven should be the cow and the bull."--Zoological Mythology, Or The Legends of Animals (1872) by Angelo De Gubernatis |
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Appearances of the Bull (also known as Taurus) in mythology and worship are widespread in the ancient world. It is the subject of various cultural and religious incarnations, as well as modern mentions in new age cultures.
Minotaur and The Bull of Crete
For the Greeks, the bull was strongly linked to the Bull of Crete: Theseus of Athens had to capture the ancient sacred bull of Marathon (the "Marathonian bull") before he faced the Bull-man, the Minotaur (Greek for "Bull of Minos"), whom the Greeks imagined as a man with the head of a bull at the center of the labyrinth. Earlier Minoan frescos and ceramics depict bull-leaping rituals in which participants of both sexes vaulted over bulls by grasping their horns. Yet Walter Burkert's constant warning is, "It is hazardous to project Greek tradition directly into the Bronze age"; only one Minoan image of a bull-headed man has been found, a tiny seal currently held in the Archaeological Museum of Chania.
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